Soulpepper Theatre's A Christmas Carol – Review

Since 2001, Soulpepper Theatre has been presenting Michael Shamata's adaptation of A Christmas Carol almost every year. It's more or less a family tradition; husband and wife Oliver Dennis and Deborah Drakeford have played Bob and Mrs. Cratchit nine times; these days their daughter Charlotte Dennis is playing Martha Cratchit, and many of the other cast members have been around for upwards of five years, including Joseph Ziegler, who plays Scrooge, and John Jarvis, who plays all the ghosts.

All this is to say that the performance is tight, professional and perfectly timed. It must also be said that the three newest cast members acquit themselves very well. Sabrina Nardi as little Fan and Belinda Cratchit, Rhys Fulton-Doyle (Peter Cratchit and the boy Scrooge sends to buy the prize turkey) and Anton Gillis-Adelman (Ebenezer at school and Tiny Tim) deliver confident and convincing performances that are not at all cloying.

The show is performed in the round, which gives it a pleasantly fluid and flexible quality, with only a few odd staging choices (having the Ghost of Christmas Present wheeled in atop a ladder doesn't quite match the splendour of the image presented in the book of a jolly giant enthroned on a mountain of Victorian Christmas food).

But there's lots of creative magic in the show: objects fly through the air; people appear and disappear in startling ways. Sound effects (fragments of carols, church bells and spooky noises) are effective and evocative, and the ghosts in particular look very supernatural indeed. In fact, their costumes, designed by Julie Fox, are quite a triumph. Rather than matching Dickens' descriptions precisely, they portray the spirit (so to speak) of each character, incorporating such earlier-dated historical costume pieces as a ghost might wear and some artistic quasi-sculptural elements.

In any case, this story can't really fail. By the end, the opening night audience was hanging on every word, and in the very satisfying and funny scene when Scrooge realizes "the spirits have done it all in one night", they were almost whooping with delight. In this 200th anniversary year of his birth, clearly Dickens has still got it.

A Christmas Carol continues at the Young Centre until December 29. After each performance, the company will be inviting the audience to enter into the spirit of the season by donating money to The Stop Community Food Centre. Up to December 16, theatregoers should plan to arrive in the Distillery District a little early to take in the lights, music and vendor stalls at the Lowe's Christmas Market.

Photo credit: Sandy Nicholson. John Jarvis (Marley's Ghost) and Joseph Ziegler (Ebenezer Scrooge) in Soulpepper Theatre's A Christmas Carol.

Ross Petty Productions' Snow White – Review

There's no handsome prince in this fairytale and a dearth of dwarves... but there is a debonair secret agent and a heroic giant-killer who's also something of a lady-killer. Of course, this has got to be Snow White, The Deliciously Dopey Family Musical!, the 17th annual panto from Ross Petty Productions.

Over the years, Petty and company have developed the traditional form of the British Christmas panto into something utterly Canadian, both in personality and in its references to topics dear to the hearts of its audience members of all ages, from Don Cherry  and Movember to the TTC. This year's edition was particularly packed with one-liners – both scripted and ad-libbed – including a few fairly gentle pokes at our potentially departing mayor Rob Ford. The musical numbers are a mashup of current popular hits; expect everything from Katy Perry to Psy.

This year's material is perhaps a little more adult than usual; it includes some near-the-knuckle double entendres like the evil queen's blushworthy opening remark to the audience "I do appreciate a warm hand on my opening." However, these sorts of lines soar right over the heads of the kids, like my ten-year-old niece, who said her favourite part of the show was Snow White's entourage of furry and feathery forest creatures.

Under the apt direction of Tracey Flye, who choreographed the shows for many years, the pace is fast and very funny, beginning at the palace, where the evil queen (Petty in drag, hamming it up to attract the boo-birds as usual) banishes the pure-hearted and lovely Snow White into the dark forest.

From this point on, things take a turn for the decidedly silly, with fairytale characters from other stories popping up to lend a hand to thwart the evil queen and her Eurotrash henchpeople. Among the good guys, Bryn McAuley as a cellphone-wielding Valley Girl of a Red Riding Hood who's keen to become Snowie's BFF is a near show-stealer ("You're the princess?!? Can I tweet that I know you???" she squeals.)

The professionalism and ease of Stratford veteran Graham Abbey is a pleasure to watch; his 007, diving and rolling at the slightest provocation, is a hoot, and he communicates at all times the warm sense that he's enjoying sharing the jokes with the audience. Melissa O'Neil is everything Snow White should be – with vocal chops to boot. Eddie Glen, returning in his longtime role as the heroine's pal, once again endears himself to the crowd with his hapless hilarity.

A true Toronto tradition in a beautiful theatre, this dopey musical is a real treat. Snow White runs until January 5 at the Elgin Theatre.

Photo credit: Racheal McCaig. L-R: Graham Abbey as 007, Bryn McAuley as Red Riding Hood, Billy Lake as Pinocchio, Melissa O'Neill as Snow White, Reid Janisse as Ham and Lindsay Croxall as one of Snow White's forest friends in Ross Petty Productions' Snow White, The Deliciously Dopey Family Musical!

Soulpepper Theatre's 2013 Season Announcement

Soulpepper Theatre has announced its playbill for 2013. The roster includes some returning favourites like Alligator Pie, Kim's Convenience and Parfumerie, and new work – including an intriguing adaptation of The Barber of Seville, to be directed by Martha Ross.   Two sets of linked plays will be produced over the summer and late fall, and they could hardly be more different in tone: Tony Kushner's deeply affecting Angels in America, and Alan Ayckbourn's lighthearted farcical trilogy The Norman Conquests.

• February 7 to March 2: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead by Tom Stoppard
• March 25 to May 4: True West by Sam Shepherd
• March 26 to May 4: La Ronde by Arthur Schnitlzer, adapted by Jason Sherman
• May 9 to June 8: The Barber of Seville by Pierre Beaumarchais and Gioachino Rossinni, adapted by Michael O'Brien and John Millard
• May 23 to June 19: Kim's Convenience by Ins Choi
• July 5 to August 17: Entertaining Mr. Sloane by Joe Orton
• July 6 to August 17: Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, adapted by Michael Shamata
• July 19 to September 14: Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes, Part One: Millennium Approaches by Tony Kushner
• July 20 to September 14: : Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes, Part Two: Perestroika by Tony Kushner
• September 27 to November 16: The Norman Conquests: Table Manners by Alan Ayckbourn
• September 28 to November 16: The Norman Conquests: Living Together by Alan Ayckbourn
• September 28 to November 16: The Norman Conquests: Round and Round the Garden by Alan Ayckbourn
• October 11 to November 9: Farther West by John Murrell
• November 3 to December 1: Alligator Pie by Dennis Lee, adapt Ins Choi, Raquel Duffy, Ken Mackenzie, Gregory Priest & Mike Ross
• November 27 to December 21: Parfumerie by Miklós László, adapt. Adam Pettle & Brenda Robins

Photo credit: Jason Hudson. Raquel Duffy, Ins Choi, Mike Ross and Ken MacKenzie in Alligator Pie

Soulpepper Theatre's Endgame – Review

As soon as last night's production of Endgame let out, I checked the program to calculate Samuel Beckett's age when he wrote it. I make it out to be 51, which was just what I was expecting. I gather Beckett was never the most lighthearted of playwrights, but this particular play is all about the things that are uppermost in your mind as you pass the Big Five-Oh: the increasing imminence of death, the growing presence of physical pain and the big question: if we're just going to die anyway, is anything worth bothering about at all?

I find it a maddening play. If you don't know it, it's about Hamm (Joseph Ziegler), who's blind and confined to a chair, Clov (Diego Matamoros), who attends to his needs, and Hamm's aged parents Nagg (Eric Peterson) and Nell (Maria Vacratsis), who have been (literally) tossed into the trash, whence they cannot escape.

In the bleakest of indoor settings, painted by set designer Julie Fox in fifty shades of grey – but not the fun kind – Hamm orders Clov about a series of pointless, mundane tasks while waiting for the inevitable end. In Hamm's universe, there is no comfort. It's cold and dirty, and the household has run out of everything nice, including (among other things) sugar plums, painkillers, blankets and bicycle-wheels. The experience of the play is not unlike spending an excruciating day or two in an intensive care ward, where what once seemed "normal" becomes an unattainable delight. ("Yesterday!" rhapsodizes Nell.)

My problem with the show is partly that it's so alien to my way of seeing things. I'm with Woody Allen, who, in Hannah and Her Sisters, confronts the same difficult question, but decides it's all worth it if you can experience a few immortal moments (in his case, when laughing at the Marx Brothers in Duck Soup).

But Endgame is undeniably elegant. It opens with a little riff on Hamlet's famous "To be or not to be" soliloquy from – name no coincidence? – Hamm ("What dreams! Those forests! ... Enough, it's time it ended, in the shelter, too. ... And yet I hesitate, I hesitate to... to end."). The play builds repeating and gradually accruing layers of detail, nuance and reference to flesh out Hamm's utterly hopeless existence; one he nonetheless seems to take some satisfaction in.

Fifty-plus years after its first production, Endgame still rings with eerie connections to life of the moment. I felt a disturbing frisson at one of Clov's very first lines: "I can't be punished any more", because it so closely echoes certain words of Ashley Smith, the young woman who took her own life in a federal prison in 2007, heard in videos released recently as evidence of her treatment while in custody. On two occasions, she can be heard saying more or less the same thing in answer to threats of discipline from the guards; her meaning is plain: "You can't make me feel worse than I already do."

In the absurdist view, human life is so awful that you have to laugh about it, but the world of Endgame seems to have run out of laughter when it ran out of sugar plums. One of the few comic lines is also among the bleakest – and to me sums up the world view of the whole play; it comes when Hamm asks Clov whether his father is still alive. "He's crying," Clov tells him. "Then he's living," says Hamm. It's an either-or proposition: living is weeping; the only end of weeping is death.

But perhaps what I find most maddening is that I'm not sure Beckett isn't just tweaking our noses. "Me to play" says Hamm, at the beginning and end of the piece. It's his chess move, that is; he starts the game. And maybe the whole depressing scenario is Beckett's own game. Are we to believe that life's just an imprisoning dungheap, or is Beckett simply forcing us to confront the possibility in case we may choose to believe something else instead?

Just as the characters of Endgame know they're in a play, and refer to that state from time to time, Beckett gives himself away; after all, he made plays. What's more pointless than that in a meaningless universe? No, Beckett believes in meaning; you might say he's all about it.

Hamm even has a tiny moment that almost resembles the warning of Marley's Ghost in A Christmas Carol, in which he refers, however archly, to one of Christianity's central commandments, one that gives a possible meaning for our mortal existence: "All those I might have helped. ... Helped! ... Saved. ... Saved! ... The place was crawling with them. ... Use your head, can't you, use your head, you're on earth, there's no cure for that! ... Get out of here and love one another! Lick your neighbor as yourself!" What is one to make of that? I'm eternally hopeful; I have my own answer, which may not be yours.

Daniel Brooks' clear and seamless direction, with the enormous energy and focus of Ziegler and Matamoros, bring all this vexing complexity to the stage in its brutal and inexorable rawness. Love it or hate it, Endgame is a brilliant masterwork. It continues at the Young Centre until November 17.

Photo credit: Cylla von Tiedemann. Maria Vacratsis and Eric Peterson in Soulpepper Theatre's production of Endgame.

Stratford Festival Expands Toronto-Stratford Shuttle Bus Service

It's very good news for Toronto-area theatre lovers – especially those on a budget. The Stratford Shakespeare Festival has announced it will be extending its existing shuttle bus service between Toronto and  Stratford. As of the 2013 season, the Festival will provide twice-daily "Stratford Direct" bus service on performance dates for only $10 each way, departing from the Hotel InterContinental Toronto Centre (Front and Simcoe).


For some time, there was no convenient way for a Toronto theatregoer who did not drive to see a play and return the same night. In 1999, the Festival launched a Saturday bus service, and it has now been expanded to give a much wider range of theatregoers access to the Festival. The 2013 schedule is as follows:

• On performance dates between May 1 and 25, 2013: Departure from Toronto at 10 a.m., with return from Stratford at 5 p.m.
• On dates when a matinee is running between May 27 and September 29, 2013: Departure from Toronto at 10 a.m., with return from Stratford at 5 p.m. 
• On dates when an evening show is running between May 27 and September 29, 2013: Departure from Toronto at 3:30 p.m., with return from Stratford at 11 p.m. 
• On performance dates between October 1 and 20, 2013: Departure from Toronto at 10 a.m., with return from Stratford at 5 p.m.

Bus reservations can be booked online or through the Festival's box office (800-567-1600) along with play tickets.


Photo credit: Erin Samuell, courtesy Stratford Shakespeare Festival

Les Fourberies de Scapin – Review

I've long been a fan of the Théâtre français de Toronto. In fact, when artistic director Guy Migneault addressed the audience before last night's season-opening performance, I was shocked to realize the company is now in its 45th season, since I so clearly remember writing about the 20th anniversary.

The TFT gives Toronto audiences a unique opportunity to hear French-language plays performed – and very capably so – in the original words. Whether the work is by Quebec's Michel Tremblay, a new Franco-Ontario playwright or some master of the classic stage, nothing beats hearing it in French. As a particular fan of Molière, I am always especially happy to see the TFT tackle one of his scripts, and last night I got to see his Les fourberies de Scapin (which translates, less mellifluously, as "The Deceits of Scapin"). Almost the last play the great playwright ever wrote, it sees the master joyfully working the business of traditional Commedia dell'Arte, with two sets of young lovers, a pair of disapproving fathers, a duo of scheming servants and a couple of long-lost children.

The company has pared the classical three-act comedy down to a lean one-acter by means of some clever strategems worthy of Scapin himself – such as turning one onstage character into a mere note delivered anonymously via a fishing line. A couple of other minor characters have been dispensed with entirely.

As a nod to the conventions of 17th-century production, which would generally have included original music and lavish dance numbers, this production includes several interpolated songs, ranging from opera to folk songs, and including some snippets of Molière's dialogue sung to familiar tunes. Although it doesn't add much of practical value to the storytelling, it's a pleasant touch, rather like powdered sugar on strawberries.

This trim amusement is no longer set in Paris of 1671, but on a beach in a dream world based on post-WWII France, with blue jeans and espadrilles; however, the elderly fathers wear clothes that suggest the 1600s (or 1700s) and antique white wigs (the work of Alice Norton, whose much more contemporary hairstyles for the other characters add a lot to the whimsical visual appeal of the production).

The tight pacing makes for a show that's over before you know it. In fact, it left me wishing I'd seen a bit more of a few characters, especially the tall, emotive and funny Phillipe Van de Maele Martin, who plays the anxious lover Octave like a cross between Danny Kaye and Tintin. Those characters who do get a lot of stage time (the fathers: Robert Godin and René Lemieux and especially the servants: Sébastien Bertrand as Sylvestre and Nicolas Van Burek in the title role) are consummate professionals who are a pleasure to watch. I dare say their portrayals will only improve as they get to fine-tune the timing and gesture in front of live audiences.

Important to note that the TFT started to use surtitling a few years ago, which means that certain performances show the text of the play projected unobtrusively over the acting area as each performer speaks his or her lines. Beginning with just a few nights of each production, the company has now secured enough financial support that about half the performances will be surtitled in this run. Combined with the expressive direction, the surtitles mean that even someone with no understanding of French at all now has access to enjoying this classic of the world stage in a short, sweet production with a great deal of charm.

Les fourberies de Scapin runs at 26 Berkeley Street (upstairs) until November 10. Tickets are available online or by telephone at 416-534-7303.

Photo credit: Marc Lemyre. Robert Godin as the foolish father Argante, standing above (left to right) Sébastien Bertrand (Sylvestre) and Nicolas Van Burek (Scapin) in the Théâtre français de Toronto prodution of Les fourberies de Scapin.

Playwrights Guild of Canada Award Winners 2012

Last Monday, the Playwrights Guild of Canada presented its awards to playwrights at the inaugural Tom Hendry Awards at Stage West in Mississauga. Here are the winners:

• Carol Bolt Award (best work premiered by a member): Don Hannah for The Cave Painter
• New Musical Award: Lorne Elliott for Jamie Rowsell Lives
• New Comedy Award: Michael Grant for Shorthanded
• Lifetime Membership: Norm Foster (pictured above)
• Post-Secondary Playwriting Competition: Leah Jane Esau for Disappeared

Also,Theatre Ontario presented the 2012 Maggie Bassett Award, which honours "an individual who, over a number of years, has made a sustained and significant contribution to the development of theatre in Ontario", to Dave Carley.